… why?

I think they took gamification too literally…

This is the best summary I could come up with:

Now, to boost the time people are spending on the platform, the company is breaking into a totally new area: gaming.

It will be doing so by tapping into the same wave of puzzle-mania that helped simple games like Wordle find viral success and millions of players.

“We’re playing with adding puzzle-based games within the LinkedIn experience to unlock a bit of fun, deepen relationships, and hopefully spark the opportunity for conversations,” the spokesperson said in a message to TechCrunch.

Non-gaming platforms have long tapped into these facts to boost their own traffic — arguably a trend that preceded the internet, if you think about the popularity of crosswords and other puzzles in newspapers and magazines.

But in 2022 it shut down its standalone gaming app amid a decline in usage: it’s putting significantly more focus these days on mixed reality experiences and its Meta Quest business.

Those have ranged from efforts in online education and professional development, through to a publishing and news operation, bringing in more video tools and courting creators and influencers.

The original article contains 570 words, the summary contains 175 words. Saved 69%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!

Not the onion?